Interview with Charlotte McDonald
Embedded content: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atH6lsQsWls&t=462s
"The growing inequality is one that is frightening, ... It's one I think people in the 19th century would recognise, as something that they were looking to avoid."
Speaker
Charlotte McDonald
Transcript
Did the Women's Suffrage Petition arise out of fear for women's safety from alcohol abuse?
Charlotte McDonald: Well, the Women's Christian Temperance Union was the main organising body out of which the petition and suffrage movement grew, but it wasn't the only one, but it was a big prompt. And it wasn't just the insecurity that came from men, but disorder in general that drink creates... or too much drink creates.
Was New Zealand a rough pioneering society in the 1890s?
Charlotte McDonald: Rough in a sense, but New Zealand was a pretty urban society by that point, you know. Towns and cities were quite established, and many people saw them as respectable, cosmopolitan, industrial centres. And Dunedin — the place where the Women's Suffrage Movement was particularly strong, temperance was being discussed, prohibition being discussed, political rights being discussed — wouldn't have seen itself as rough.
How did the desire for women to have the vote come about?
Charlotte McDonald: Well look, it came from a number of sources, but it had been talked about for decades before 1893. So people such as Mary Ann Muller in Nelson writing in the Nelson Examiner, the local newspaper, under a pseudonym, arguing why couldn't women get the vote? This is at the time, in the 1860s, when people were arguing that all men should have a vote. So if that's the case, on what basis are all women excluded?
So she writes a series of columns saying, if the argument around the Second Reform Act in Britain, is that all men now have a vote, because they should have a right to say if their government... on what basis then do you exclude all women? If it's no longer a vote on the basis of property, then why do you exclude all women from that? If its irrespective of occupation, irrespective of education, then why should it be exclusive of all women?
So there's the principle about representation, and that remains really the core all the way through, that if you are subject to laws, you have a right in the making of the law. If you're subject to a government, you have a right to play a part in the making and shaping of that government. So those political principles, which are very practical and very real, are there all the way through.
How important is Kate Sheppard in the campaign for women's suffrage?
Charlotte McDonald: Well, she is important. She does lead the actual campaign from the late 1880s through to 1893, and she keeps being important after 1893 as well. So she is important. She's a political thinker, she's a strategist, she's an organiser, and she's a wonderful writer.
So you need to write pamphlets, you need to give speeches, you need to inspire people, you need to strategise around parliamentary voting — the party system. How do you get your allies to vote [laughs] for you in parliament? And she does all of that extremely well.
Has suffrage for women created equality for women today?
Charlotte McDonald: Well, the formal legal differences have been removed in the main, but that doesn't necessarily create equal social opportunity. And we know that there is a gap in what women earn — what women and men earn; we know there are differences in representation on things like Boards of Directors, and still in places like parliament and the courts. So there are still differences; there isn't equal participation in the same — exactly the same kind of ways. So equality in social terms, is a different set of issues, or comes to mean different kind of things.
Would you describe the suffrage movement as 'women versus men'?
Charlotte McDonald: I don't know that the suffrage movement was something against men; what it was, was a movement for a right to participate, a right to access to power, to parliament — which remains an important form of government and power. So that is critical, and it remains critical, but that in itself doesn't deliver day-to-day realities for people in all aspects of their lives; it's part of it, but it doesn't wholly create the means by which people live.
Are women still at the bottom of the economic pile?
Charlotte McDonald: It's... economic systems exist and they are based on inequality...And at present those economic systems are creating quite substantial inequalities.
The nature of women's lives is such that they have tended to own less property, to have access to less... economic power, high-earning jobs. And in situations of greater inequality, those polarisations get larger, and I think that's certainly what we're seeing at present, is a greater polarisation.
What are the obstacles to women having better economic outcomes?
Charlotte McDonald: Well, I think it's there right from early on. But that's not to say that inequality is immediately created only by gender; that's one aspect, but its a whole set of things that intersect. And there are forms of inequality that exist in New Zealand, in which its where you live, what kind of education your family is in, whether you've got a decent house to live in.
All of those are also going to be about educational performance, about access to jobs; access to the means to determine your own life.
How do we do better from a woman's point of view, and from a nation's point of view?
Charlotte McDonald: Well, I think we go back to some of the principles about, what are the ideals? What is it that we believe in? What was it that people campaigned for, in the hope that having a vote would be a good thing.
And it is something which is a great thing, and we should, and can be proud of it. But it doesn't deliver on its own. Its important — legal equality is utterly important. Political participation is absolutely important; nobody wants to give those up. But it doesn't, on its own, give you a roof over your head. It doesn't, on its own, give you a full-time job. It doesn't, on your own, give you the means to raise a family, and have sufficient income.
And, you know, that's one of the big problems at present.
What do you know about the Māori women who signed the Treaty of Waitangi?
Charlotte McDonald: Knowing that women did sign the Treaty, I think, has been a very important piece of historical knowledge, that that was the case. We know that women occupied positions of power in amongst hapū, amongst iwi, and there they were also in 1840 putting themselves forward, and being part of those discussions.
And I think what we know is that more would have signed, and wished to, but often it was somebody else pushing them to the back, and saying, 'You're not part of a political decision here.'
And the fact that forty years later, women are also involved in the campaign for the vote, I think is just a continuity of that. We know that women within the Kotahitanga Parliament, for instance, stood up and said, 'We have interests here. We are political actors. We want to determine what the world is like. We want to have a say in decisions that are made.'
And the same in those who were signing the petition as well, is that they saw the world of politics, the world of power as also their own world, and where they wanted to have a say.
What is the role of the Treaty and the Women's Suffrage Petition in our new ‘super-diverse society’ ?
Charlotte McDonald: I think they continue to be fundamental to what New Zealand is, because its history doesn't go away. The current is always going to be something different, but how we're shaped, how we do things, how the society is organised is based on historical events. So those constantly are alive in our midst, and it's how we organise things, but it's also how we know about things, and what makes us different.
So I think going into the future, we're going to be talking about why is it that we have Treaty? Where did it come from? Why might it still be alive in this country now? Which is about ourselves as people, but its also about the land around us. Its about resources around us, it's about how we distribute power, why we might consult with tangata whenua or mana whenua in local government.
So that's always going to be explained by, we have a Treaty, and this is how its alive now. And the same with the Women's Suffrage Petition; we have a history in which women had the vote earliest, and were proud of that. We constantly want, I think, many of us to live up to the ideal of what [laughs] it represented.
So that continues to be something we talk about, it might often be an idea that we feel were not quite fulfilling. But it becomes a point to go to back to, to talk about.
What is your vision of the future, based on the Treaty and the Petition?
Charlotte McDonald: Well, I think we're a society that does have a sense of itself as being something, something of itself. And when people then think about, well what is that? Some of the things they look to are the place — the place that we inhabit, the society that grew historically from the meeting of Māori and Pākehā, or the people who become Pākehā, and how that goes on. A society, in which we saw ourselves as having some sense of fairness and parity.
And I think that's where the early success of women's suffrage is part of that parity; that we participate together. And that ideal somehow continues to inhabit who we are, and what we want to be. Again, thinking about speaking out from a small place, to the wider world in ways that talk about fairness and participation and self-determination; which I think is there both in the Treaty and in what women were seeking with the vote as well.
What is your message to the young women of today, 123 years since the Suffrage Petition?
Charlotte McDonald: Don't forget your history [laughs] because women fought for that right. It wasn't one that was given by parliament, it wasn't one that was given by men, it wasn't one that was handed on a plate; it was fought for actively, vigorously and against quite a lot of resistance, and it continues to matter.
It continues to matter to have a say in how youre governed. It continues to matter to participate.
Why aren't we teaching these histories in our schools?
Charlotte McDonald: It's a strange thing. I think it's partly that people assume that we know, and of course it doesn't necessarily happen that way [laughs]. We have got Kate Sheppard on the $10 banknote. So there's a place where you might stumble over history by accident. But, you know, we are quite reticent in some odd ways about our history in this country; either because we assume we know it, or assume that we don't have it, or assume that its too difficult, and its too much of a problem, therefore its too hard to face. So all of these things are very different options.
I think increasingly New Zealanders are interested and prepared to confront what is a really interesting, and at times a hard history. And it has these such different things in it, the Treaty that had great idealism, as well as great argument in it, when it was first signed and debated, or debated and not signed, right through to the present.
The Women's Suffrage Petition argued for, rejected, refused three times, before it even got there. People saying, 'No, this is a ridiculous idea. Why would women ever want to vote, this will wreck the parliament,' et cetera. And then finally the weight of agitation, organisation and the argument is there.
You know, these are dramatic histories, and they gave people power that was very considerable — the power to vote. So that history is immensely dramatic; one what we have whether we're proud of it or whether we just need to understand it.
But we have it; it's ours.
How do we extend the rights and freedoms of women in NZ to our new refugee women, who have come from backgrounds and religions with no rights or freedoms?
Charlotte McDonald: I don't think it's something you can give to people quite like that. I think they are now living in New Zealand, and many will become citizens of New Zealand. And in the course of doing that, they will take on and have the scope and rights of citizens and voting subjects in this country.
So what people do with that, is then up to them. But the law and the political rights become theirs, as part of becoming part of the history of this place. Again the law and the formalities only go so far, beyond that there are then all the social questions, people's day-to-day lives, which are not necessarily those dictated by law and politics.
How does the growing gap between rich and poor in NZ relate to these three historical documents?
Charlotte McDonald: The growing inequality is one that is frightening, I think. It's one I think people in the 19th century would recognise, as something that they were looking to avoid. And particularly in the 1890s, when people were looking for a political system that gave greater breadth of participation, why people did want representation, so that power wasn't concentrated amongst those only who had property.
So the political principles there remain very important, and ones that continue to be of significance. How that power is used, how resources are distributed, how New Zealand participates, or not, in a global economic; these are complicated questions, which require political debate. So I think that's what unites all three of these documents; at the time that they were produced, and in their continuing life. They keep on being alive, relevant, debated ideals to be brought into being.
Apart from electing representatives every three years, are we active enough in our own democracy?
Charlotte McDonald: Yeah, I don't think we elect and forget. I think its where political debate occurs, isn't it? Parliament is one place. But whats the political debate that's going on amongst the selection of candidates with what issues, what questions do people want to know about candidates? What do people follow in terms of what's being voted on in parliament?
All of those things are the kinds of things that were being followed in the 1890s or so, where people did argue about those kinds of things, and they were organising also, in other ways; in unions for instance, which were also new at that time. So the right to belong to a worker's collective, a union, and for that to be a legal thing to do, was a relatively new idea.
So unions had a life of being quite big political units, part of New Zealand's political life; they aren't nearly so much now, for all sorts of reasons. So politics happens in many places. Petitioning was one place where politics happened, public meetings is another place. So where is that occurring? So it's not just around a one-time, once every three years; political debate has to keep occurring, and across different places.
But political discussions are everything, aren't they? Theyre about what do you spend your income on? Who does the dishes? Who is the student rep in a school? All of those are political matters, arent they? But they're the big things too, aren't they? How much are we going to tax, and how are we going to tax? Who is going to pay tax? Who gets appointed to certain key positions? What is the level of a wage increase or not? What are the level of benefits or not?
All of those decisions are ones which, yes, we want our politicians to vote on, but we need to be debating as well.
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